Are You a Bro?: Brocab 101

Think back on this: 2007 was a big year for the bro. The famous phrase “Don’t tase me, bro!” catapulted into meme-status, and The Onion published a pristine piece called “Bro, You’re A God Among Bros” which parodied the tendency of bros (or brahs, if you prefer) to create portmanbros like Bromo sapien and brofessional. Over the last half a decade, we’ve seen the rise of bromance(a close friendship between bros), brogrammer(a bro computer programmer) andBronies (bros that are into My Little Ponies), proving bro is an innovative and useful new addition to the English language. While these novel usages find their roots in ’90s surfer culture, they now are ubiquitous among those who have never come in contact with a surfboard.

Whether or not you are a bro might be determined by how you use the word. While bro may carry pejorative connotations, among bros it is often used as a term of endearment as in “Hey, bro. How you doing, bro?” On the Oxford Dictionaries blog, Katherine Connor Martin brings up this metonymic quality of brodom: “by being the sort of person who says ‘bro,’ a person becomes a bro. In the immortal utterance ‘don’t tase me, bro’ it is not the person doing the tasing who is the bro, but the person being tased.” Bros also recognize that the term can be loaded. In a recent interview on Slate, BroBible managing editor J. Camm admits: “There’s still a negative stigma attached to the word bro, [...] But we’re slowly changing that connotation.”

Where did bro come from? It first entered English in the 17th century as an often-written abbreviation for “brother.” By the early 1900s, it could refer to a “guy or fellow” or a “male friend or buddy.” This usage originally surfaced in African American slang to refer to a fellow black male.

Gene Demby, over at NPR’s Code Switch blog, breaks brodom down into four qualities: stonerishness, dudeliness, preppiness, and jockishness (though a bro need not possess all these qualities). Demby asks whether the current definition of bro requires a discussion of race. His informal poll concluded that broness is generally associated with white, privileged men, however, there are exceptions. One Twitterer responded that “It’s about wealth/privilege & often sexist attitude. Not implicitly about race.” For some, maleness is not a prerequisite for brodom either; there are lady-bros (sometimes called Beckys).

While not all bros are white or even male, these presumed descriptions accompany most discussions of bro culture. In September 2013, Ann Friedman suggested that the term bro and its offshoots have taken off so spectacularly in the last few years thanks to the fact that it allows for talk of this particular type of person without launching into a political discussion: “‘Bro’ is convenient because describing a professional or social dynamic as ‘overly white, straight, and male’ seems both too politically charged and too general; instead, ‘bro’ conjures a particular type of dude who operates socially by excluding those who are different.”

In our most recent update, Dictionary.com added a new sense of bro that captured this common usage. We also added a few of the most ubiquitous portmanbros.

(What other words did we add to the dictionary? Here’s a round-up of our favorites.)

What’s the most interesting portmanbro you’ve seen or heard? Does anyone you know call people “bro”? Do you?

@wolf tamer and coal miner
I’m not entirely sure. You can always check Youtube for his videos, but I’m currently unable to. (Public computer and all.)
My guess is that he probably doesn’t, since the videos I’ve heard about involve horror/suspense games.

Well …this is almost an interesting article. Kinda sorta’ funny in passing. However, since 2007 seems to be the suggested pseudo-genesis of the term “bro”, it may be worth submitting here for accuracy, that it’s use was common parlance among enlisted men, irrespective of any particular branch of service – circa 1969, Republic of Viet-Nam, or just “the Nam”.

Generally, a term of exclusion if you will, among black enlisted men.(The intention being, if you were not black, you were not a “bro”. It automatically was followed by an extraordinarily complex and eventually tedious handshake). By the way, RAP/Hip-Hop has roots dating back as far as ’69-’70 as well.

Slowly, however, “bro” was adopted by the “stoner/surfer” crowd, and I think to the current day holds a certain predominance in that crowd. Although, the “How I Met Your Mother” fans have added another not so subtle shift to the usage.

@RaindbowDash
Pewdiepie is a popular internet “idol”, sort of. He makes live (or pre-recorded) video walkthroughs of video games, although I think it’s less of a walkthrough and more of amusement at his reactions to some things. This is a second-hand explanation though since I’ve never watched the videos myself, but you can find plenty of them on Youtube.
Also, from my first-hand experience, a Brony is a male fan–usually around the age of mid-adolescence or late thirties–of the show My Little Pony, not just a male pony. Pegasister is probably the same. (I think you meant that description anyways, but I’m just clearing it up.)

The term ‘bro’ – originating as an abbreviation of the word brother – with various nuanced meanings, dates back at least to the 60′s and 70′s, . I’ve heard it used by all races as an affectionate greeting as well as an ironic/facetious interjection in a statement. “Don’t tase me, bro” sounds like something a doper would say in a confrontational situation while it also contains a sense of self-parody. I’ve also heard it in a conversation where one person tries to schmooze the other, i.e., “Don’t you agree, bro?” and the response was, “Don’t bro me, man . . . I’m not your bro.”

WHO IS PEWDIEPIE?!? :/ and, here are the mlp defininitions you guys were questioning:
BRONY: a boy or male pony
PEGASISTER: female pony or just a female pegasus
hope this helps, and again, WHO IS PEWDIEPIE?!?

My friends and I call each other “bro” all the time, those of us who use it the most are neither male nor sexist. The description of a “bro” given above is certainly not what we are, or what we think of when we use the term. At least for us, it’s really just a chill thing to call your buddy. The inherent chillness of “bro” is not synonymous with the assholenness described in the article above.

My dad calls me bro occasionally, but it’s typically in informal situations where it’s just us. For instance; he was driving the car the other day and said,”Hey bro, can you pass me my water bottle?”, point proven.

@anonymous:
Thanks, but what I meant was what are his (her?) videos about? What makes them funny? (And before you tell me to watch them and find out, my parents don’t allow me to watch YouTube videos without their permission.)

I have to agree it comes mainly from surfer dude culture. It might have been carried over from Hawaii, but they generally say “brudduh” instead of bro. Of course there’s “bubba,” which is a southern word meaning brother, but these days it’s used almost exclusively in a derogatory sense as a synonym for redneck to insult someone with a southern accent. Only very recently have I heard bubba being taken back to its correct roots on shows like Ax Men, at least the Florida constituency.

As for church usage it’s almost always “sister” and “brother” and “sister woman” and “brother man” just watch Cat on a Hot Tin Roof. It’s not nearly as common now, but it was very common back in the day.

An interesting expression at my college fraternity (Hillsdale College) was “bros before hos.” Now I don’t know where that came from, but it was seemingly not a brand new expression and that was in 1997. I agree with the other people that say that the word originated with the much-caricatured Hawaiian/Socal surfer/stoner culture, where the surfer/stoner punctuates everything he says with words such as “dude,” “sweet,” “cool,” “gnarly,” and the ever-present “bro.”

you guys have it totally wrong, a “bro” is a white trash dude from so cal that rides dirt bikes and drives a lifted truck, and where metal mulisha clothing and almost all of them are stoners. you can even look up so cal bro on Google or you tube.

Re: “brah” in light of bro, I was recently looking at a list of Pidgen English words used in Hawaii. I saw the word “brah”, Pidgen for brother, and realised brah and bro must be closely related. It’s not surprising that brah would become part of California surfer culture, probably directly from Hawaiian surfer culture. I live currently in New Zealand where bro is very common.

i highly disagree with your point Craig i just see you as an internet troll and your closed mindedness is similar to the closed mindedness of many awful people i have had the displeasure to meet, i hope your closed mindedness ceases and then you shall forever be in shame for your closed mindedness towards slang many words we use today were once considered slang evidently you have not had a good source material for this view or even your points, and my cousin is medically diagnosed as retarded, feel good about yourself now Craig. Personally i don’t use the word bro however what right do we have to judge them.

One last thing rich check the definition of some of your words because obviously you need an education yourself in grammar so before you reconcile and distinguish others use of the word make sure you can understand words yourself

Btw rickedy rick shut up because people have said that way before the 1997 so just shut up. I find it funny that u would even try to save that brah is actually even more retarded so before u say that check facts retard

Bro is freaking stupid it is just an abbreviated word used for people that think there close but really are just like people say sis. It’s retarded and degrading and I think it should be classified as slang. For all people who say bro your just lazy and really should just accept that. Thank you

The article you linked to by Ann Friedman is extremely bigoted. She has a habit of bigoted writing. Any time you single out a person’s race, gender, or sexual orientation as a reason to judge them, that’s bigotry. Please refrain from linking to bigots in the future.

I think it is quite myopic to associate bro with only wealth or privilege. I am Ibibio, a tribe in south eastern Nigeria, and I remember on visits to the village, hearing youths calling their older male siblings or relatives ‘bro’, short for brother. That was way back in the 80′s. So, if there seems to be a proliferation of the term now, it should not be associated with white privilege. It’s always been there. Just like the term ‘sis’ seems to be creeping up.

Bro is what you’d call a friend or a brother. People call their friends bro because they are like brothers and bro is short for brother. Some people use the Bro Code, which is pretty much a set of rules guys use on how you treat your friends…so it’s not a big deal, bro.

Beckys are girls that are mad promiscuous and basically just a casual sex hook up for other bros., mostly a black thing (Juicy J from Three 6 Mafia “Get that Becky when I’m gone..” basically saying he’ll hook up with some random broad in a couple hours after he’s faded.

I’ve heard both the “short for brother-man” and a white, middle-class way to assert manliness. Personally, I use it to describe a particular type of dude: young (teens-lower 30s) and obnoxious in the way that they have to comment on everything. But to each their own.

1. Bro. is a title used among Christian fraternity to address a man while Sis. is used to address a lady who belong to the same community, usually in those churches that are more fundamental than the formal mainstream churches.
2. The usage of “bro” is now increasing in India in the context of addressing male friends as brother while “sis” has been used all along for female friends.

What the ……? Since when did “bro” become this…… “His informal poll concluded that bro-ness is generally associated with white, privileged men”? Are you serious? Obviously the author knows of no one who lives a life of meager means. “Bro”, where I’m from was short for brother, aka brother man. It was always used as a greeting between two black guys, as a term of endearment. Eventually, if you were cool enough with everyone else in the hood, you could get away being white and calling your friend bro., thus making yourself like his brother, cool and on the same level. This rambling about “bro” being upper-white class phraseology is rubbish.It was never something you’d hear at private school and was only popularized through the entertainment industry in the late 1990′s with the release of hood films. Rich white kids never used the term until they saw “Boyz in the hood.” Either way, the term was meant to show someone that you were/are on the same playing field, no better, no worse, that you are equals in one struggle. Remember 70′s movies black power….”keep up the good fight brother man,” bro is simply a shortened vocalization of this phrase. How it got bastardized to become some fleeting salutation between older white guys who have this intrinsic need to “feel cool” so that their bland lives will be filled with something other than lattes and oxfords, is well beyond me. But I, for one, am against it. Leave the hood lingo where it belongs…and don’t call me “bro” bro, ’cause you don’t know my struggles enough to call me that…dude!

Well, dudebros, you all forgot to give worthy mention to “brah”, which I’m also seeing on the internets now in unexpected places.

Technically, I personally started bro culture, but with a surfer accent, as I’ve been calling people “brah” since 1997, which I derived from Californian surfer slang.

What I believe happened, was the internet butterfly effect, as my calling people that on internet forums and online games far predated bro culture, but was probably mimicked by onlookers and changed to “bro”.

My proof of this is comes from my gamefaqs.com nickname “DARTH RAMBO” which I invented in 2002, and have since used on countless other games and forums including xbox live to this day. In 2002 I was the only Darth Rambo on the interwebs. Now there are hundreds of copycats. I can’t even take my created namesake on new mobile phone games I download any longer because some unoriginal poser has already registered with that name. MY name!

I am very certain my use of “brah” that possibly kickstarted bro culture is another distinct example of the internet’s copying behaviour.